


New Song

by ClaraxBarton



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: AmeriHawk, Birthday Cake, Established Relationship, M/M, Multi, Natasha is the best bro, Shrunkyclunks, Sort Of, that's what it's called right?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-10
Updated: 2018-08-10
Packaged: 2019-06-24 17:12:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15635106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClaraxBarton/pseuds/ClaraxBarton
Summary: Bucky was doing a pretty good job of convincing his friends he wasn't miserable, spending his birthday alone in a bar thousands of miles away from where he should have been.And then he spilled beer all over Captain America.





	New Song

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kangofu_CB](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kangofu_CB/gifts).



> A short birthday fic for an amazing lady.  
> It was supposed to just be a short thing with a bathroom blowjob and instead this is what happened. No blowjobs. I'm sorry.
> 
>  
> 
> A million thanks to Ro, the best of all betas.

  
  


It took him awhile to get the setup right. Long enough to attract stares. 

 

Well, long enough to attract  _ more _ stares.

 

People had been staring at Bucky for what felt like his entire life, but really had only been the last few years. 

 

He wasn’t used to it, didn’t know if he wanted to get used to it, but it no longer made his gut clench and his shoulders tense when he felt the prickle of awareness along his spine that meant someone was looking at him. 

 

Still, as fucking dumb as it was, as much of an idiot as it made him feel, it was a relief, in some ways, when Bucky noticed people were staring at him and rolling their eyes. Shaking their heads. Smirking. Laughing at him.

 

Better than running from him. 

 

Eventually, he got it right, though. He propped his giant fucking phone - god, he still remembered his first phone, a flip phone that fit into his pocket and that he was only supposed to use to text his mom with when he was done with baseball practice or band or debate or JROTC and on his way home, but that he used way, way too often to text his girlfriend and then his boyfriend late at night - against the unfortunately/fortunately sticky menu stand and the empty shot glass that had been left behind when the table had been cleaned off between the last patron and Bucky’s arrival. 

 

He thumbed on the vid app so he could see what it looked like, finagled the positioning so that the phone could see the decor of the dive bar, get a good view of the pool game going between the - Bucky was willing to lay down money - lesbian girlfriends and two guys who had absolutely zero chance of getting either girls’ number. 

 

Bucky made sure his beer, something wittily-named, elaborately-labeled, stupidly-complicated local Brooklyn microbrew, was in full view, and then he pulled out the cupcake from the paper bag he had carried into the bar, the bag that had been searched because- Bucky was hoping it was because the bartender wanted to be safe, and not because he didn’t like the look of the guy with a metal arm and a brown paper bag in his hand. 

 

He shoved a candle into the center of the slightly crushed, very sad-looking chocolate cupcake with chocolate frosting and shiny pink sprinkles all over it and started the vid call.

 

It took several rings, took a moment for the bar’s WiFi to make the connection, and then-

 

“BUCKY!” It was a loud, off-pitch chorus of his name that was somehow simultaneously the most annoying and the best sound in the world.

 

He didn’t even try to fight the grin that caught at his lips, just let it spread across his face and-

 

“God, you assholes look like shit,” he had to say.

 

Laughter greeted his pronouncement. And maybe he hadn’t been lying - they did look rough. Dugan had a black eye and a broken nose, Morita looked like he had been in desperate need of a shower for at least a week, Falsworth had bags under his eyes so well-defined they looked like a good place to take a nap, Gabe and Dernier were leaning heavily on each other, looking like they had been dragged out of bed and were just barely functional, and- and Pinky and Happy weren’t there. Junior was-

 

“How’s the kid?” Bucky asked, not bothering to hide the emotion in his voice.

 

“Eh, still in medical. Tried to bribe the nurse to get ‘im out for this, but-”

 

“You tried to ask her out on a date, and she slammed the door in all of our faces,” Morita interrupted Dugan, grinning, and Bucky- 

 

Fuck. Bucky should be there. Pinky and Happy should be there too. They-

 

“Ahem, gentlemen, we are here for a reason.” Falsworth cleared his throat, giving his best uptight, posh British accent that he always laid on thick, even though it never got him laid, and even though it was so fucking obviously fake.

 

Morita and Dugan stopped trying to elbow each other out of the vid frame, and came to- Well, not attention, but almost attention.

 

Bucky rolled his eyes.

 

Falsworth winked at him.

 

Gabe and Dernier did something off-screen, and then they were holding up the biggest, ugliest, most pathetic-looking cupcake  _ thing _ Bucky had ever seen. And in the middle of it was a fucking road flare. They lit the road flare, started to sing ‘Happy Birthday’, and it was awful, it was so off-key and out of sync, and-

 

Falsworth whipped off his shirt to reveal himself, fully naked except for a fucking diaper and  _ Happy Birthday Bucky Boy _ scrawled on his bare chest in black marker, and-

 

Bucky lost it, nearly falling out of his chair, crying he was laughing so hard, and-

 

 _Jesus Fucking Christ,_ _he missed these guys, and-_

 

And yeah, maybe not all of the tears were from laughing. Okay. Most of them weren’t from laughing. But he was still laughing. And they were still fucking singing, if you could call that shit  _ singing, _ and-

 

Morita shoved Dugan’s face into the road flare cupcake, and then they started throwing handfuls of it at each other, and Bucky had no idea where they were but it was really only a matter of time, and-

 

“What the hell is going on?”

 

There it was. 

 

The Commandos froze, looks of shock and  _ oh fuck, now what _ on their faces, and-

 

Colonel Phillips sneered as he walked into the vid’s frame.

 

“What- Sergeant Barnes. Of course. You’re not even my problem anymore, and you’re still my problem.”

 

“Sir,” Bucky managed a salute, knowing it was sloppy as hell, but just- Falsworth was in a fucking  _ diaper,  _ and-

 

“Lieutenant,” Phillips addressed Falsworth directly. 

 

“Sir.”

 

“I expect all evidence of… whatever the hell this is… to be gone in ten minutes, are we clear?”

 

“Yes, sir!” Gone was any trace of Falsworth’s phoney accent. Dugan and Morita looked ready to piss themselves from laughter. Gabe and Dernier were staring at the ground, nudging each other’s shoulders, red-faced and clearly on the verge of dying.

 

Phillips flicked his cool gaze back to Bucky.

 

“Good to see you, son.” And then he walked away.

 

Everyone was left in shocked silence for what felt like eternity, but then-

 

Dugan cracked first, doubled over and giggled like a schoolgirl, and then Morita lost it, and then Gabe, and then Bucky, and then Dernier shoved a piece of the cupcake down Falsworth’s diaper, and-

 

The tears were definitely all from laughing this time. Bucky was clutching his sides and trying his best not to puke. 

 

Christ, these guys. His guys. They were such a bunch of lunatics, and-

 

Eventually, they all remembered how to breathe, settled in, and the guys ate cake off of each other and Bucky picked at his glitterly monstrosity while they talked, sipped his beer and tried his best to imagine he was there with them, just a few feet away instead of thousands of miles.

 

Fuck. He didn’t even know where they really were. Deployed somewhere dangerous as fuck, based on what he’d heard about Junior and the Commandos’ last mission, and the way all of them looked. 

 

“You still got that hot PT guy, or what?” Dugan asked Bucky, drawing him away from that line of thought as if he could read Bucky’s mind.

 

Bucky snorted into his beer.

 

“No, no, I don’t have that hot PT guy anymore,” he growled.

 

“Uh-oh,” Morita leaned forward. “Don’t tell me you met someone immune to your charm?”

 

“No, I met someone who was 5000% not interested in dick. I didn’t even-” Bucky picked up his beer in his left hand, trying to distract himself from the still-too-fresh memory by cataloguing the sensation of his metal fingers running over the damp label. 

 

“Oh, shit. He tell you that before or after you tried to suck his cock?” Gabe asked.

 

Everyone shoved at him while Bucky glared.

 

“It’s a legitimate question! You all remember what happened with Bucky and that UN guy when we were stationed in Pakistan and-”

 

Bucky groaned. Were they never going to let him live that down?

 

“It wasn’t like that,” Bucky assured them. “I never even got to ask him out before he told me how disgusted he was by ‘fags’.” It was tough to do air quotes with his new hand - not to get the shape right, but to time it right with his other hand. The techs at Stark Inc assured Bucky it would get better with time, as his brain learned and re-learned how to move.

 

“What?” Dernier looked ready to fight, and Bucky had to grin.

 

He took a sip of his beer and leaned back in his chair, ready to tell them the whole pathetic story, and-

 

His left hand, the hand holding his beer, the hand that was a billion-dollar metal masterpiece or something, the hand that was going to be the fucking  _ death _ of Bucky, encountered something firm and unmoving and-

 

Bucky looked over his shoulder just in time to see it happen, felt the world slow down the way it sometimes had when he was in a firefight and it felt like he could feel each pulse of his blood as his heart pumped, and-

 

The firm, unmoving object was the built as fuck chest of a tall, dark-blond haired man with a slightly darker beard and biceps that Bucky wanted to die between and-

 

Three drinks in his hands, three drinks that clattered as Bucky’s fucking hand and his fucking beer bottle collided with them and they fell to the floor, tilting against the guy’s chest and his groin and  _ soaking _ him, and-

 

Bucky looked up, horrified, moving out of his chair and flailing at the falling bottles, his right hand somehow - fucking  _ somehow _ \- grabbing hold of the guy’s thick as fuck thigh and-

 

He slipped in the puddle of beer, slipped and fell, and ended up with his fucking face in the guy’s stomach as the guy grabbed him with hands that felt like they could easily lift a bus, and-

 

_ Jesus Fucking Christ _ .

 

Bucky finally got a good look at the guy’s face.

 

“Oh my god.”

 

He fumbled free of the man’s grip, turned back to his table and scrambled for the phone. He saw the concerned looks on the Commandos’ faces, but-

 

“Guys, I gotta go, I just spilled beer all over Captain America.”

 

—-

 

Bucky didn’t know if he had apologized too much or not enough.

 

He’d been patting at Captain Fucking America’s soaked body with napkins for what felt like an eternity, mumbling  _ imsorryimsorryimsorryimsorry _ over and over again like a fucking prayer, but since the ground hadn’t opened up under his feet and swallowed him, it was clear  _ no one _ was out there listening to him.

 

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.”

 

Bucky looked at the long-fingered, strong hands wrapping around his wrists and holding him in place.

 

‘In place’ being-

 

Bucky swallowed hard and made himself look up, instead of focusing on how close his fingers were to the zipper of Captain America’s jeans. Soaked jeans. Jeans that looked literally painted onto his thighs and-

 

“Uh, hi,” Bucky mumbled, and why the  _ fuck _ wasn’t the floor swallowing him up right now?

 

“Hi.” Captain America’s blue eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled. His beard curved around his lips, and fuck-

 

Bucky swallowed and stared and-

 

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry I-”

 

“It’s okay,” Captain America assured him, giving Bucky’s hands a gentle squeeze before letting them go.

 

Bucky took a step back, letting his hands fall away, clutching wet napkins between the fingers of both hands and making himself think about the texture of the napkins, tried to convince his brain that his left hand could feel it, tried to distract himself in  _ any _ possible way from the reality of the situation.

 

“Can I buy you another beer?”

 

Bucky frowned as he met Captain America’s earnest blue eyes.

 

“What?”

 

“Can I buy you another beer - since yours is, well, all over me now.”

 

There was a glint in Captain America’s eyes, a slight tilt to his beard and his smile and-

 

If Bucky wasn’t standing in front of a hundred-year-old living monument to all that was good in the world, he would have  _ sworn _ the man was trying not to say something filthy and full of innuendo.

 

But he  _ was _ standing in front of a paragon of virtue and, really, it was probably just Bucky’s wishful thinking and lifetime of fantasies, and in  _ no way  _ was Captain America coming onto him or-

 

“Shouldn’t I be the one buying you a new drink? Or drinks?”

 

Captain America shrugged one shoulder.

 

“It was my fault as much as yours - I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going and-”

 

“I flung my arm in front of you. How were you supposed to anticipate that happening?” Bucky argued.

 

Captain America arched an eyebrow.

 

Bucky felt his face heat up. Right. Captain America.

 

“Look, it’s fine. I-”

 

“It looked like you were celebrating with your friends.”

 

“Yeah, it’s my birthday and-”

 

“Then I definitely have to buy you another drink.”

 

Bucky rolled his eyes and sighed.

 

“Look, I- I know you’re just, living up to the image or whatever, but it’s okay! Really, it was my fault and-”

 

“One drink, please. Unless I’m bothering you?”

 

Bucky had one of those insights, the kind of almost out-of-body realization that he had sometimes gotten in the field and-

 

“Holy shit, you ran into me on purpose. You- Are you  _ hitting on me _ ?”

 

Captain America-

 

Captain  _ fucking _ America blushed.

 

He blushed, and he scratched at his beard, and he gave Bucky a rueful grin and-

 

“Holy shit,” Bucky breathed. 

 

And stared.

 

Captain America cleared his throat, still blushing.

 

“I-” 

 

He caught himself, glancing over Bucky’s shoulder with a frown.

 

Bucky followed his gaze and saw a red-haired woman and a blond-haired man sitting at a table a few feet away, three empty bottles at the table, and the man making a frantic cutting motion just below his chin, as if he was telling Captain America to  _ stop _ .

 

“Friends of yours?” Bucky asked, and then-

 

_ Fuck _ . 

 

That was Hawkeye and Black Widow.  _ The  _ Hawkeye, Bucky’s personal hero, his favorite Avenger, the-

 

“I’m not sure that’s the word for them,” Captain America said with a sigh. 

 

Bucky looked away from the table of  _ Avengers _ to the man standing in front of him, still wet, somehow managing to look awkward as all fuck despite the fact that he was- 

 

Was Captain America.

 

And what the hell was Bucky doing?

 

“A drink sounds great,” he managed to say, and Captain America’s  _ face _ lit up like- like Bucky had just told him it was Christmas morning, or that there were no more Nazis or something like that.

 

“Yeah?”

 

Bucky nodded.

 

“Yeah.”

 

Captain America grinned and gestured for Bucky to lead the way to the bar.

 

Bucky grabbed his phone, shoving it into the pocket of his cargo shorts - because yeah, he’d pulled himself off of his couch so he didn’t look pathetic, but he hadn’t planned on meeting any Avengers while out.

 

He listened to Captain America order another round of the beers that Bucky had spilled - or that maybe Captain America had spilled? Intentionally? - and felt a prickle along his spine.

 

Looking over his shoulder, he saw that Black Widow and Hawkeye were watching them.

 

Hawkeye gave him a smirk and a thumbs-up and-

 

Okay. 

 

“What did you want?” Captain America asked him.

 

“PBR,” Bucky said, happily abandoning the Brooklyn microbrew he had only ordered to piss off Falsworth in the first place.

 

“Let me- let me at least help you carry those,” Bucky insisted, snagging his PBR and a bottle of Stella from the other man, their fingers momentarily tangling together before Captain America let go of the two bottles.

 

The brush of Captain America’s fingers over Bucky’s left hand felt- 

 

Well, it felt like the slightest pressure and warmth, because that was all that the arm could sense, but, in Bucky’s mind at least, it felt like more.

 

They walked back to the table, the table with the  _ other _ Avengers, and Bucky tried really, really hard to act cool.

 

But then Hawkeye smirked at him again, and Bucky almost tripped over his own feet as he sat down beside the guy at the table.

 

“Hi,” he said, feeling like an idiot, feeling like he had  _ less _ than zero game and-

 

“Hello,” Black Widow practically purred, her sharp gaze raking over him and her full lips curving up into a smile that was somehow predatory and sexy as hell, and Bucky frankly didn’t know how to feel about the way his brain was reacting to the fight or flight response she inspired in him.

 

She grabbed the Stella from him, and Captain America sat down in the chair between Bucky and Black Widow, and for a moment everyone was silent, and Bucky wondered if  _ now _ was the time the floor would finally open up and-

 

“So, I’m Clint.”

 

Hawkeye held out a hand, and Bucky stared at it.

 

Wow.

 

Just.  _ Wow _ .

 

His hand was callused and strong, and their palms fit together perfectly and-

 

He shook it, probably way too enthusiastically judging by the smirk on both his face and Black Widow’s.

 

“Natasha,” she held out her hand, and Bucky let go of Hawkeye to shake her hand as well, less enthusiastically because she frankly terrified him.

 

“Steve,” Captain America held out his hand next.

 

Bucky rolled his eyes, but shook it as well and- 

 

Yeah. His right hand in Captain America’s firm grip felt kind of tingly and-

 

“Bucky,” he said when he realized that everyone was looking at him expectantly. 

 

“Bucky?” Captain America repeated, grinning again as he let go.

 

“Yeah, well, James. James Barnes. Bucky is- ‘s what everyone calls me.”

 

Hawkeye nodded, raised both eyebrows and shot Captain America a look while he took a sip from his beer.

 

“Well, Happy Birthday, Bucky,” Captain America said, lifting his beer.

 

Bucky tapped his own against it, and both Hawkeye and Black Widow followed suit, with a chorus of Happy Birthdays as well.

 

“So, Sergeant Barnes, come here often?”

 

The question was from Black Widow, and Bucky had absolutely  _ not _ given them his rank.

 

“Sometimes,” he responded, feeling weirdly on guard. Or maybe not weirdly. He  _ was  _ sitting at a table with two of the best assassins in the world, probably  _ the _ best spy in the world and-

 

“It’s nice,” Captain America said, looking around. “We came here last week when there was an open mic night and Clint, uh, I don’t think we can call that singing?”

 

Hawkeye huffed and leaned back in his chair.

 

“Sure, sure. Pick on the guy who was doped up on pain meds. Hey, if I recall, Mr. I Couldn’t Possibly Sing I Only Know Music From Ninety Years Ago And No One Knows Who The Andrews Sisters Are Anymore,  _ you _ -”

 

“Seems like a long name,” Bucky muttered, because it did, and because, for a moment, those few lines of banter reminded him of the Commandos and-

 

Hawkeye gave him a wounded look, and Captain America smirked.

 

“What have you done since your discharge?” Black Widow asked, and  _ seriously, _ how did she-

 

Bucky had literally  _ just _ told them his name.

 

“I’m going to school,” Bucky answered, meeting her gaze. 

 

One corner of her lips tilted upwards.

 

“Why economics?” she asked.

 

Bucky sighed.

 

“It’s-”

 

“Nat, this isn’t an interrogation,” Captain America said, voice mild but something like steel underlying the rich baritone.

 

Black Widow looked between Bucky and Captain America, shrugged, and took a sip of her beer.

 

“Economics, though?” Hawkeye asked. “A guy like you?”

 

Bucky arched an eyebrow at him. 

 

“A guy like me?”

 

“You know,” Hawkeye waved a hand in Bucky’s direction. “You don’t look like the kind of guy who loves books.”

 

Bucky had to raise an eyebrow, unsure what exactly that meant.

 

“It means he thinks you’re too hot to be a nerd,” Black Widow supplied.

 

“Oh. Oh.”

 

Bucky looked between Hawkeye and Captain America. He had  _ thought _ that Captain America had been hitting on him but- 

 

What the hell, was Captain America just being Hawkeye’s wingman?

 

Was  _ Hawkeye _ interested in him?

 

Bucky felt completely out of his depth, and he was  _ sure _ he was reading the signals around him completely wrong.

 

Because he was Bucky, and they- He was sitting with the  _ Avengers, _ and-

 

“I joined the Army because I couldn’t pay for college and my grades weren’t high enough for a scholarship,” Bucky admitted. “I’m not a nerd. And I had a lot of time to learn to love books when I was recovering,” he lifted his left arm.

 

Captain America nodded.

 

“Books are useful for that - recovery.”

 

Which kind of brought a bit of a standstill to the conversation.

 

Black Widow rolled her eyes and did something under the table to Hawkeye. He made a sound, shied away from her, and glared. They seemed to silently communicate with each other for a minute, and then-

 

“So. Army? What, uh, what’d you do?”

 

Black Widow looked at Hawkeye with an expression that looked somewhere between fond and exasperated.

 

“I was an Army Ranger. Served three tours in Afghanistan, one in Iraq, and then,” Bucky lifted his arm again, “was in the middle of another tour, in Somalia,” Bucky said.

 

“Thank you for your service,” Captain America said, voice solemn and expression-

 

Bucky looked away from him.

 

It was weird - Bizarre? Existential crisis level what the fuck? - to have Captain America thank Bucky for his service when he was… Captain America.

 

Black Widow let the silence sit around the table for barely a heartbeat before-

 

“Well. You three are perfect for each other.”

 

Bucky looked over at her with a frown, Captain America sighed, and Hawkeye  _ grinned _ .

 

“Aw, Nat. Are you giving your blessing?”

 

Black Widow rolled her eyes and tossed back the rest of her beer.

 

“Happy Birthday, Sergeant Barnes,” she said as she stood up. She came around the table and held out her hand.

 

He stared at it dumbly for a moment. She gave his own right hand a pointed look.

 

They shook hands again, and she smirked.

 

“Have a good night. And Clint is  _ very _ ticklish behind the back of his right knee.”

 

“I- What the- C’mon, Nat! I thought we were friends! What kind of wingman just goes and-”

 

“Wait. Wait.” Bucky dropped Black Widow’s hand and looked at the two men still at the table. The two  _ Avengers _ still at the table. “She set this up- This is- What exactly is going on?”

 

Black Widow smirked again, reached out a perfectly-manicured finger, and tapped Bucky’s chin.

 

“You are very pretty,” she said, and then she walked away.

 

Bucky turned back to the table and-

 

Captain America was blushing, and Hawkeye was smirking.

 

“So, birthday boy, any other plans for the night?” Hawkeye asked.

 

Bucky took a long sip of his beer and considered.

 

“Am I being propositioned here?” he had to ask, because this whole thing - surreal didn’t even begin to cover it.

 

“Yeah, you’re being propositioned. Or- Cap, you got some fancy words for it from back in the day?”

 

Captain America rolled his eyes, but then he looked over at Bucky and grinned, a slow upward slide of his lips that did all kinds of unexpected things to Bucky’s heart.

 

“I’m no drugstore cowboy, but if you can put up with that wise guy gammin’ over there, we could blow this gin mill and head back and cook up something with gas.”

 

Bucky had literally  _ no _ idea what Captain America had just said to him.

 

From the expression on Hawkeye’s face, he seemed to be in a similar boat.

 

Captain America rolled his eyes.

 

“Yeah, we’re propositionin’ you, doll.”

 

_ That, _ Bucky understood.

 

He looked between the two men and had to smirk.

 

_ Happy Birthday to Me _ .

  
  


-o-

  
  



End file.
